Brussels---The leaders of France and Germany on Friday handed Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras a weekend ultimatum to strike a debt deal with EU-IMF creditors or risk default.
Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande told the leftist Greek premier in brief talks on the sidelines of an EU summit that Saturday's meeting of eurozone finance ministers was critical.
"They reminded him that this meeting was crucial and decisive and that it was vital now to work towards a deal on a package that includes reforms, investment and financing," a source said.
But Tsipras, who has rejected creditor demands for more austerity in return for unlocking bailout funds that would allow Athens to meet an IMF payment June 30, told them he could not understand their "harsh" stance.
"Alexis Tsipras informed the two leaders on the Greek proposal and stressed that the Greek side does not understand the persistence of institutions in such harsh measures," a Greek governmental source told AFP.
Meanwhile Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the head of the Eurogroup of finance ministers, said a deal had to be clinched on Saturday or there will not be enough time for it to get parliamentary approval.
"Tomorrow it really has to happen, for the simple reason that it has to go through parliament, first the Greek then of several member states," the Dutch finance minister told journalists in The Hague.
Asian markets sank again Friday on the new Greek fears.
- 'Chaos, disorder' -
Greece and its creditors have been locked for five months in bitter negotiations, unable to agree on a set of reforms Athens must implement in return for a final 7.2 billion euro ($8.1 billion) payout from its bailout.
It needs the money to pay the IMF 1.5 billion euros ($1.7 billion), and Germany's EU Commissioner Guenther Oettinger warned absence of a deal would mean an exit by Greece from the eurozone.
"'Grexit' is not an objective for us, but it is inevitable if we don't find a solution in the next five days," he told German radio Deutschlandfunk.
French Finance Minister Michel Sapin said: "Every day that passes brings us closer to the inevitable... a form of chaos, of disorder."
But Greece's outspoken finance minister Yanis Varoufakis said Greece remained firmly committed to remaining in the eurozone, all while sticking to its anti-austerity principles.
AFP
